[JaredWoodcock]

I agree with the school of hard knocks, but it also takes all kinds of education if a wide audience is needed. Many different strategies may arise and most will not result in more draft loggers but they might help with public perception and awareness which will lead to a growing market for the work???

[JaredWoodcock]

As a college administrator I say Ron is spot on. Pretty frustrating.

[JaredWoodcock]

You have another greenhorn on board with me! I am putting together a certificate course for the college I work at right now (SUNY Adirondack) for landowners with woodlots and how they can begin to manage and harvest them. Part of this course is going to revolve around who do you hire? I hope to cover small machine operators and draft animal loggers and within the next few months I will be reaching out to the draft animal world to see who would like to present and demo their craft. This only tangentially relates to what you are talking about but it is another way of getting a better understanding of draft animal traction into the minds of the general public.

I would love for their to be some sort of association. Two factors gave me the confidence to take the plunge this year: 1) Our local state forester told me that when I get my business going he will feed me much more work than I can even handle. He says there is a huge need for the small horse loggers in our area, the second was having great conversations at the field days this last summer. Being able to talk to many different folks about the way they operate their business was priceless.

I am running the logging business a lot like my small farm though. I am only offering the horses and I as a service and we are charging hourly. I am not confident in selling logs but people keep asking me if I will help them out in various ways, so work is starting to pile up. My current job includes a 2200ft skid to the landing which is not cheap by the hour, but the landowner is going to add value to the timber by building a barn with it. He also feels that it is priceless to be able to work side by side with the horses to harvest the timber for the barn that he will be building with his own hands. The rest of the work that is waiting is mostly pulling firewood. Most of the landowners will agree it is worth paying me hourly to pull the wood because it may cost a little more than doing it themselves, but the first time they fold their pickup truck around a tree their firewood operation gets really expensive quickly.

I will see you this weekend and maybe we can talk more about how I may be able to help move this forward with my connections in academia. (or maybe why we should keep it far away from academia?)

[JaredWoodcock]

It is hard to see in the picture but it has a low platform with a 30inch arch in the back, I had to put the pole pocket lower than planned because the new tires were taller, because of that I put the evener on top and ran a 2×2 tube from the arch to the evener strap similar to mark’s piggyback. As I wrote in don’s post I can easily and quickly step over the arch onto the platform. The Platform is short, putting the handrail close enough to grab from the ground behind the arch. Like I said before I had plans to change the arch before I even got to try it but I was impressed with how well it worked the other day. The log in the picture was 22 feet long hard maple and when the pole would lift shifting my weight onto the platform would balance it out nicely. I hope to get a lot more time in on the arch and I will pick everyones brains at Brad’s workshop on march 12.

Thanks for all of the advice and looking to more in the future.

Jared

[JaredWoodcock]

Here is a picture my customer took the other day with our first trial run of the new arch.

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[JaredWoodcock]

My new log arch is a hybrid design but I made sure that it was something that I could step onto easy based on everyones advice here. We had a good solid logging day last weekend and in many different situations I stepped on and off of the back without even thinking about it. I credit that feature to our success for the day, and the fact that the horses stood amazingly 😉

I will try to remember to get some pictures on here to show how even with a 30inch arch you can step on and off.

Donn, your young mule training stories make me want to come hang out on your farm to watch some of the shananigans, sounds like some fun for a guy who likes a challenge!!!

[JaredWoodcock]

When is the guernsey due to freshen, who is she bred to?

[JaredWoodcock]

Any numbers or percentages to note when boring the center of the hinge? (Ex. never bore the center of a hinge when the hinge is less than XX wide, or the bore cut is xx percent of the hinge width?)

Thanks

[JaredWoodcock]

Donn, you are helping people make a good start, and all of the scary stories are very important tools! I think twice about things now and I have some pre-flight checklists because of reading about mishaps.

I was just raised around horses from before I could walk so I went through most of my life without thinking about it. As I became an adult and started to meet different folks I realized that I might just be getting lucky and I need to consider some of the safety issues more deeply. Having interns around working horses helped me understand the magnitude of the working horse.

I didnt write what I meant. It is a lot easier to hear the scary stories and the depth of commitment that is needed and think that horses arent for you, but in the end the large majority of the time it is simple, relaxing, and “easy” to have horses as working partners.

This is me knocking on wood 😉

[JaredWoodcock]

Sounds like you have a lot on your plate, get involved with as many workhorse people as you can and enjoy this year as a time to learn and adjust your systems on the farm accordingly to possibly take a horse or two on in the future. The more you hang out with horse people the more likely you will find a horse that works for you.

[JaredWoodcock]

Most guys around us have had 3 or so boils by now. Our buds are starting to look ominous in some of our warmer microclimates, we will see how long it lasts…..

[JaredWoodcock]

It will be interesting for newbies like me to see how equipment and methods change to adapt to poor conditions. How do the guys down in the mid atlantic do it? The winters down there are historically more moderate with lots of thaws.

[JaredWoodcock]

Sorry I haven’t gotten back to you yet. I didn’t settle on an insurance carrier yet because the jobs I have right now don’t need it. If you talk more closely with the agents you can probably get your rates sub $800. They put a lot of things in the plans that I don’t need and add up to a big bill. I will dig up the quotes and try to get back to you soon.

[JaredWoodcock]

Don’t let the stories scare you too much. I have been working with horses on and off my whole life and I didn’t start to get fear and anxiety until I found this site. I know it sounds funny but hearing some the of nasty and scary stories has got me wondering if I am just lucky and I am counting my days until my stories get nasty? Donn is right, the breed doesn’t matter, all horses are individuals and from my experience the bigger horses take less energy to work with then the smaller more “spirited” horses.

[JaredWoodcock]

I have a soft spot for old style morgans as well but you might have better luck finding canadian horses or draft cross breeds if you are looking for a lighter horse.
Welcome.

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